A Belgian teacher who killed a love rival by sabotaging her parachute was sentenced to 30 years in prison today.

Els Clottemans, 26, who was convicted of murder yesterday, had faced a maximum sentence of life in jail. The judge told her the only mitigating circumstance was her feeble psychological condition. Clottemans attempted suicide in 2008.

Els Van Doren plunged to her death in November 2006 after both her parachutes failed.

She and Clottemans, members of the same parachute club, were involved with the same man, a Dutch skydiver. A jury in the town of Tongeren agreed with the prosecution that Clottemans was motivated by jealousy.

The jury said Clottemans acted with premeditation and that, as an accomplished jumper, she knew very well how to disable a parachute. Evidence at the trial showed she sent anonymous letters about Van Doren's love life to mutual friends and that she was psychologically unstable.

Her trial opened on 24 September with the accused sitting nervously near the mudcaked parachute bag and helmet that Van Doren wore on the day she died.

The jury saw video footage from a camera mounted on her helmet that Van Doren shot during what would be her last jump.

She and Clottemans were among the last four jumpers to leave the Cessna plane.

The video showed how the victim looked up, yanking at her gear, hoping to see an open canopy above her.

Neither parachute opened and she crashed into a garden in the town of Opglabbeek and died instantly.